8 Nights of Danvers Chanukah
by queercapwriting
Summary: The Danvers family in a series of Chanukah one-shots, ft. extreme Sanvers fluff with Alex bashfully introducing the holiday to Maggie; dangerously competitive dreidel nights with the Superfriends; Kara's first Chanukah with the Danvers; Kara x latkes (enough said), and more.
1. Chapter 1

**Thank you so much to the Anon who suggested this fic!**

 **Kara's first Chanukah with the Danvers, ft. a very angsty teenage Alex.**

* * *

Alex had been sullen the first time Jeremiah and Eliza tried explaining Chanukah to their new daughter: to her new sister. The sister she's always wanted, except this girl… _wasn't_.

This girl got her even more teased than she already was; this girl made Alex's own strangeness – which until then had been somewhat passable because at least she was stellar in the classroom _and_ on a surfboard – more noticeable, less acceptable.

Less _human._

And here this girl was, this girl who asked "Santa who?" in front of the entire junior class, now not even knowing about Chanukah, about family and about light in the midst of oppressive darkness, and hell, not about dreidels and latkes and homemade donuts made from eating holes into those Pillsbury biscuit dough things.

And, worse – Alex had a _chemistry project she had to be working on, Mom, come on, I thought you cared about my grades_ – her parents were making her sit through their explaining it all to a perpetually confused-looking Kara, who'd asked, wide-eyed, if the Jewish god was one of the deities who served under Rao.

"Well, honey," Jeremiah was saying, "maybe it matters less the name we call a deity – Yahweh, Allah, Hashem, Rao – and maybe it matters more the kinds of good things we do because of our faith in them."

"Like what?" Kara was all big eyes and eager curiosity, and Alex, on the couch adjacent to Jeremiah and Kara's love seat, was all rolling eyes and impatiently tapping foot. Eliza shot her a look and she stilled her foot, but not her eyes.

"Well, what would you and your parents do, on Krypton? For Rao, or because of Rao?"

Alex burned to hear the answer; burned to know about other planets, other lives, other possibilities, because this one, this life, these possibilities? Were self-destructing every moment.

And yet the fact that Kara had all this knowledge, that Kara and Kara alone had entire encyclopedias worth of information that Alex could never ever hope to have, just because she grew up on a different planet – and that was to say nothing of what she could do with her body – made Alex cross her arms over her painfully growing chest and wish she didn't long so badly to just have a regular sister.

"Um… Rao was named for the sun, and the sun was named for Rao, so that's where we get… _got_ … our light. And we're... we _were..._ always supposed to pass it on to one another. For the good of the planet, and all the people living on it."

Eliza nodded slowly and Jeremiah did, too. Alex watched Eliza's keen, doctor eyes and knew she was wondering what a passing on of social light must have done for scientific progress, medical progress, on Krypton. She was looking at Kara like Kara had so many answers, like she had so much to give: Alex remembered when Eliza looked at _her_ that way, when she'd come home with an idea for a new experiment, a new painting. Now, the only looks she got from Eliza were _oh Alex, how could you let Kara turn on the oven with her heat vision, I thought you were smarter than that?_ and _Alexandra, Kara is new to this planet, I would expect you to be able to warn her about everyday school occurrences like school bells so she doesn't think they're alarms_ and _Alex Danvers, stop squinting so, you're human and you're not going to develop heat vision like your sister._

"Great Kara," Alex smarmed, "so the lesson here is that the Jewish god wants the same thing that your Rao god does, hope and good for everyone, so just celebrate Chanukah with us _so I can get back to my project._ "

"Alex – "

" _Alexandra!_ "

"I'm _sorry._ " She tossed up her hands but rolled her eyes, waiting for the _disappointed in you_ speech from her mother.

But her father held out his hand to indicate to Eliza that he would handle it, and he just looked at her long and hard, with soft but burning eyes. He crossed the living room in a single step and crouched in front of her, putting his hand on her knee as she glowered down at him with half-hearted defiance.

"Actually, Alex, what I was going to say to Kara was that we'd love to welcome her into our celebration of Chanukah, but she doesn't have to participate if she feels it's disrespectful to her beliefs. And, I was going to say that we'd love it if Kara would like to share with us any customs from Krypton to honor Rao and her people that we could integrate into our own celebration."

His tone was calm and his tone was kind, and it did nothing but infuriate Alex.

"Good. Great. A very _Kryptonian_ Chanukah. Like celebrating Chanukah wasn't enough of a thing to get made fun of for, now it's _alien_ Chanukah."

"Alexandra – " Jeremiah swallowed hard and considered letting his wife light into Alex like he knew she was ready to, all furrowed brow and _How could you say such a thing_ speeches. But Alex had a steely look on her face that he recognized too well; the look that said, snarky as her remarks were, that it was taking immense strength to contain the depth of rage, of pain, of hurt, that truly underlied her comments.

He glanced back at Kara's wide, teary eyes and heaved a sigh, trying to figure out what to say to Alex before realizing he didn't have to say anything at all.

Because Alex, too, had noticed the wobble of Kara's chin, the twitching of her bottom lip. The water in her reddening eyes.

And suddenly Alex was up, scrambling over Jeremiah, and across the room, pulling Kara into her arms and holding her close.

"I'm sorry, Kara," she said, and Eliza closed her eyes and sighed, looking like she was either counting to ten in her head or sending up a silent prayer of praise for her elder daughter. "I'm so sorry I said those things. I… hey. Why don't I make you some latkes while you tell me some stories about Rao? Okay?"

Alex pulled back from their embrace and wiped Kara's nose with her own sleeve.

"I'm sorry," she said again, and her heart wobbled.

She'd seen other kids at school put that look – that abandoned, hurt, rejected look – on Kara's face before, and she made up her mind, then and there, to refuse to be that person, that person who made Kara look like that. She was supposed to _protect_ Kara from the people who made her lip tremble like that.

And she would. She would do better. She would be stronger.

Rage and hurt still coursed through her blood like fire, but she watched Kara's face – as she wiped her tears and swept blonde hair out of her sister's watery eyes – transform from grief into hope, and it soothed her boil into a mere simmer.

"What's a lat kah?" Kara asked with a sniff, and instead of groaning, Alex grinned, standing up and wiggling her fingers down toward Kara, who took her hand gingerly, desperately trying to avoid the first time she'd held Alex's hand and broken two of her fingers.

"Let me show you."


	2. Chapter 2

**_Kara and Maggie bonding over pre-Chanukah grocery shopping._**

 _(An activity I did on my lonesome today [I'm writing this on the 24_ _th_ _] – I'm bringing in the first night by myself, alas, but I'm super excited because I effing love to cook, so obviously that's bleeding into today's fic… sorry not sorry!)_

* * *

"Yes, yes, of course you can leave before sunset for the holiday, Danvers – religious accommodation and all that legal nonsense – but I want that story on my desk before you do!"

Kara adjusted her glasses determinedly and nodded, her forehead scrunching up furiously as she marched out of Snapper's office, knowing full well that he half expected her to not be able to make her deadline.

And if she didn't have an inside source in the NCPD that she could ask to spill all the details while going grocery shopping for tonight – because god knew Alex wouldn't do it, Chanukah or not (fruits and vegetables, Alex always had in the house; things to be cooked? Not so much) – he might be right.

But fortunately for Kara, she had recently added a certain NCPD officer to her speed dial who, she knew from Alex, usually had a lunch break around now.

"Little Danvers!" Kara could hear the smile in Maggie's voice, but also the thin layer of surprise, of nerves, of stress, and she wondered what kind of demons her job was making her face down today.

"Hi Maggie. Listen, I'm working on a story about police and alien relations since amnesty, and I know you're really busy, and I don't want to take advantage of your… of you, but I – "

"I can meet you in an hour, Little Danvers, no sweat, but look, I can't talk right now. I'll pick you up from CatCo in an hour, okay, but I gotta go now. See you in an hour."

Kara hung up, her brow slightly furrowed and her heart slightly racing. Her sister's girlfriend – she still had to get used to saying that – made her nervous, and she couldn't quite figure out why.

She thought it might have something to do with having to really share Alex's time, attention, and ice cream with someone else for the first time.

She thought it might have something to do with the utter confidence with which the detective held herself, and the way it intimidated Kara, made Kara wish that she were that way, that she was able to own herself, her sexuality, her desires, like Maggie did. Both guarded and right on her sleeve, all at the same time.

She did while she was Supergirl. Not as much while she was Kara.

She shook her head vigorously like she was trying to get water out of her ears, and started scratching away at her notepad – an hour to prep for all the things she needed to ask Maggie. For the article, anyway.

All the things she needed to ask her in general would take much longer.

* * *

Kara was so lost in her writing that she jumped when her phone buzzed, nearly capsizing a water bottle onto her notepad.

 _I'm outside, Little Danvers_.

She smiled and she swallowed and she smoothed her dress and she straightened her glasses and she made for the door.

Maggie grinned behind tired eyes and a slightly sunken posture when she saw Kara blinking out into the winter sun, and tossed her a helmet when she was in range.

"We're riding?"

"I assumed you'd wanna get coffee, and Noonan's is too crowded for me this time of day."

Kara shook her head. "Actually, Maggie, I uh… I kind of need to go grocery shopping. For Chanukah tonight. Snapper's letting me off early so I can make it home for sundown, but with this article I'm not going to have time later – "

"Say no more, Little Danvers. We can put the groceries in the saddle bags. Hop on."

Kara hesitated and Maggie cocked an eyebrow.

"I've never ridden on the back of anyone's bike but Alex's."

"I'd never let anything happen to you, Kara."

Kara was at once moved and offended. "I'm not _scared_."

Maggie tilted her head and scrunched her face slightly, making her exhaustion at once disappear and become more obvious. "Aren't you on an article deadline?"

Kara huffed and shoved the helmet Maggie'd given her on her head, mock scowling as Maggie laughed, pulling her own on. She revved the engine as Kara got on, slipping her hands around Maggie's waist, and Kara couldn't help but wonder if Maggie was trying to show off to her girlfriend's little sister

The thought made her smile.

* * *

"So, what's Chanukah shopping require?" Maggie asked after she parked the bike and they headed into the grocery store.

"You'll see. So, tell me about the NCPD."

"Whaddaya wanna know?"

And just like that, Kara and Maggie proceeded to have the strangest conversation anyone had had in that grocery store to date.

"… and I guess there's some competition, disagreement, between the science division and the rest of the precinct, you know, because your outlook changes when you actually work with aliens versus when you don't think you know any – Baking powder? Why?"

"Eliza used to make eggless latkes – they're potato pancakes, you know, did Alex tell you about them? – because Jeremiah didn't have great cholesterol levels, so potatoes, onion, flour, baking powder, and that weird stuff that comes out when you grate the potatoes – "

"… potato starch?"

"Yeah! That'll make them perfect every time."

"You alright there, Little Danvers? You look like you're me fantasizing about your sister in a bikini."

"I was thinking about _latkes_ , not… _Rao_ , Maggie! It – I – so how would you say working with aliens has changed your outlook versus someone who hasn't?"

Kara wondered if Maggie being in the middle of an apparently rough day at work was lowering her inhibitions, if jokes were her way of dealing with stress, and maybe they were, but Kara appreciated that Maggie didn't push her mild-mannered, innocence-oriented comfort level too far: she went along with the change of subject with only a smirk.

And then –

"An entire bag of apples?"

"For applesauce!"

"And you don't wanna just… _buy_ applesauce."

" _Maggie_ , Alex says you're a great cook, I thought you'd understand! It's best when it's homemade!"

"No arguments from me, Little Danvers, just with all that ordering in you both do, I didn't peg you as a chef."

"Well you didn't peg my sister as a lesbian, either, and look where that got you both for a while there."

"Rude! Also deserved."

"You think I'm going to be a _wonderful_ sister-in-law." Teasing, leaning sideways, a massive, faux-innocent smile on her face.

"I do, actually." Softly, slowly, deeply, emotionally. Passionately, nervously. Wide eyes when Kara's smile changed from silly to serious, from teasing to accepting.

"So, go on, a few of you are trying to get your captain to change policy on what counts as a crime for certain species – "

And then –

"Pillsbury biscuits? Biscuits are a Chanukah thing?"

"Not _biscuits_ , Maggie! _Donuts!_ You carve out the middle and you fry them and you sugar them and _Rao_ they're incredible!"

"You're getting that face again, Little Danvers. That me thinking about your sister on her motorcycle face."

"I thought it was you thinking about her in a bikini."

"Both devastatingly attractive thoughts."

" _So is thinking about donuts, okay?_ "

Which made them both double over with laughter, incapacitating them for a solid minute and a half.

Somehow – exactly how was lost on both of them – Kara and Maggie got to the checkout, Maggie carrying all of Kara's groceries as Kara had been furiously scribbling in her notebook the entire time Maggie talked.

When Kara fumbled for her card to pay, Maggie beat her to it with a grin.

"Consider it one of my contributions to the lighting tonight," Maggie told her.

"One of your contributions? What's the other?"

"Getting you home on time by giving you all the remaining info you needed for your article. Also I told Alex I'll bring wine."

"Ugh, Alex doesn't need any more wine."

"I know. She's down to a glass, or a bottle of beer – not both – a day now."

Kara's eyes lit up when they met Maggie's. "Really?"

Maggie nodded and thanked the cashier, hauling Kara's grocery bags off the counter and out of the store.

"You really love her, don't you, Maggie?"

"How could I not, Kara?"

"Tonight's gonna be your first Chanukah?"

Maggie nodded again. "Anything I should know?"

"Chanukah's for family."

Maggie swallowed and her eyes suddenly stung: she'd thought this had been going well. She'd done Kara a favor in the middle of an impossible work day, even took her in a grocery store to do it, and she'd made Kara blush with her talk about Alex, but she'd also made Kara laugh and she'd paid for everything and... she thought it'd been going _really_ well.

Apparently she'd been wrong.

Apparently Chanukah was for family, and she wasn't going to make the cut.

She looked at her feet and she tried not to vomit.

Kara bent so she could look up into Maggie's eyes.

"And since Chanukah's for family, you'll be right at home."

She could swear Maggie sat up a little straighter, a little prouder – she could feel the massive, unwavering smile on her face throughout her entire body, even though she couldn't see her face – as she made her way to her bike, as she drove Kara back to CatCo, as she sped away.

* * *

"Eight hundred fifty words on NCPD and alien relations since amnesty, sir. I'm proposing we make it a series. I have a reliable source, detective rank, in the NCPD who's willing to do what it takes to make sure there's accountability on all sides here, starting with what the media reports."

She waited as Snapper finally dragged his skeptical eyes off her face, chin held high as Cat would want it to be; waited as his eyes scanned the pages she'd presented to him; waited until he looked up and told her gruffly, "Looks like you've got yourself a series, kid. Don't screw it up."

She practically skipped out of the office, knowing better than to so much as let her mouth open, because if she did, the stream of thanks and excitement that would babble out would surely make him change his mind about the whole thing.

"Oh and Danvers," he called, and she turned, entire body braced for him to tell her that he changed his mind, that her hook was all wrong and sources too skewed and a series was a stupid idea, anyway.

"Happy Chanukah," he said, with something that looked suspiciously like a half smile on his face.

Kara bounced on her toes and beamed, but before she could open her mouth to thank him, he waved the back of his hands at her like they were hanging from his wrists. "Out out out out, no need to look at me like I just saved your first born from the wrath of god."

Kara tilted her head and furrowed her brow. "That's… Passover…"

" _Out!_ "

She scurried, but with a massive smile re-plastered to her face.

Snapper had liked her story; Snapper had said something nice on a personal level to her (which honestly both made her happy and freaked her out a little); and Maggie liked teasing her without ever making fun of her and Maggie liked spending time with her even when she was having a terrible day and Maggie didn't think she was just an annoying little sister who would intrude on her time with Alex.

Something must be right in the world for Chanukah, after all.


	3. Chapter 3

**Superfamily dreidel smackdown, ft. a deeply competitive Sanvers and a wide-eyed Kara.**

* * *

"No no no no no. There aren't dreidel _teams,_ Maggie doesn't get to be on Alex's _team,_ know why? Because there are no _teams_!"

James sat back and sipped at his beer with a grin: this might take a while, as Winn's look of indignation and proclamation that there were no teams in dreidel cowered slightly against Alex's sitting up on the couch and leaning in toward him.

Kara flickered her eyes between them like she was watching a tennis match, and James leaned in to Maggie. "This is gonna be entertaining." She smirked back at him.

"And how would you know this, Winn, with your superior knowledge of all things Jewish?"

"I would normally never say anything like this, but considering that we're playing a gambling game based around a spinning top with _chocolate_ for currency, I'm gonna feel free to go ahead and say it: you're gonna play the _religion_ card? Alex Danvers, that is _low!_ "

"Whoaaaaa!" James and Maggie exploded with simultaneous laughter, both leaning forward and tossing their arms in the air haphazardly.

Winn and Alex both shot them dirty looks.

"I'm trying to _advocate_ for you here, babe."

"Dude, come on, whose side are you _on_?"

"Man, it's _Alex_ , and I don't have my Guardian suit right now, so I'm pretty sure she could kick my ass without breaking a sweat."

"And you wouldn't take an ass kicking for me?"

"From Alex _Danvers?_ "

"Okay!" Kara held up her hands as Alex sat back, arms crossed, smug triumph written all over her face, as Maggie bit her lip, both utterly amused and turned on by the fact that a man as powerful as James knew with certainty that her girlfriend could take him with one armed tied behind her back.

"No one will be kicking anyone's ass," Kara announced with a pointed look at Alex.

" _They_ brought up the ass kicking, that wasn't me."

Kara pointed an accusatory finger at her, and Alex shut up, but stuck her tongue out at Winn, who scoffed back at her.

"Winn, when you were new at this last year, James was _also_ new, so you both had another newbie to be confused with. Maggie doesn't have that, so let's have her partner with Alex for a couple of rounds until she gets the hang of it, and then she'll get her own gelt and turn. Okay?"

"Kara, did you ever consider being an elementary school teacher?" James wanted to know.

"That's _exactly_ what I was thinking!" Maggie whispered, reaching around behind Alex to slap James five.

"You both realize you just compared us all to five year olds and claimed that _Kara_ is the most mature one, right?" Winn asked.

Maggie and James immediately pursed their lips and looked down in a stunned kind of shame. Alex smirked and Kara lifted her chin.

"Alright?"

"Okay," Maggie leaned forward toward the table and clapped. "Someone finally gonna tell me how this whole top thing works?"

Alex beamed at her girlfriend and took the dreidel Kara was passing her.

"Alright, so. This? Dreidel. Each side means something different, let's you take or give a different amount of the gelt – the chocolate coins – that's all pooled in the center."

To illustrate, Winn upturned the box of Chanukah gelt he and James had picked up from the store and pre-ripped out of their bags. The little discs with golden foil clattered all over the table, and some scattered on the floor.

Kara snatched one, and Winn slapped at her hand, but before he could even get to her, she'd unwrapped it and popped it in her mouth, giggling maniacally.

"The mature one," Alex nodded at Kara with a smile in her eyes. "So, everyone takes a turn with the dreidel. You spin it – " She demonstrated. "And whatever it lands on…" She waited. "Dictates what you do."

"This letter, nun, stands in for nisht. Means no, nothing. So, you land on this – "

"Loser!" Winn interjected, and Maggie choked on her beer.

"You don't get to take any gelt," Alex said as she nudged Winn in the ribs. "This," she rotated the dreidel, showing Maggie its second side, "is shin, shtel, telling you to put something in, so you have to toss in a piece of candy to the pool. This, gimel, gantz – "

"The money maker!"

"The chocolate getter!"

"The sugar rush bringer!"

"I hate all of you. Means you get to take everything that's in the pool. And this last side, hey, halb, means half, so you get half of the chocolate pool."

Alex put the dreidel down and grimaced playfully as she looked Maggie in the eyes. "I know that's a lot. You good?"

Maggie picked the dreidel up and turned it around in her fingers for a moment, examining each side and nodding to herself. "Mmhmm, good. But uh, why'd you say it'd be easier for me if I'm on your team? Couldn't I just spin and you guys tell me what to do based on how the dreidel lands?"

The four of them erupted in laughter, and Alex grabbed at Maggie's hand and sought her eyes with her own to make sure she knew they weren't laughing at her. "We would if we were a normal family, babe," she informed her grimly. "But we don't play regular dreidel. We play – "

"Dreidel Extreme!"

"Speed Dreidel!"

"Sudden Death Dreidel!"

"I… can't say I'm an expert, but that whole sudden death part sounds pretty antithetical to the spirit of the holiday," Maggie smirked.

"Basically, the second the dreidel lands, you have to shout out what you do – all, half, give, or none – before everyone else can, or you have to give back a piece of chocolate."

"And trust me, you don't want to give up any of this chocolate," Kara said through a full mouth, and Alex grabbed a fistful of the chocolate coins from her hand and scattered them back on the table.

"Kara, you can't eat all our game pieces before we even play the game!"

"Sorry." She didn't tell Alex she'd stashed a couple more pieces up her sleeve. Kara watched Maggie notice, but they winked at each other and said nothing.

"Guys, if it's okay, I think I'll be on my own team. I like trying new things, babe, I don't mind if I lose a few rounds."

"Oh babe, I don't want you to miss out, and you already lose all the time at pool. You sure?"

Kara stared suspiciously at Maggie, a hint of a smile tugging at her lips, but Maggie had kept her secret, so she said nothing.

"Yeah, let's do it," Maggie said gamely, leaning forward and resting her elbows on her knees, eyes wide and innocent.

The game was loud and the game was fast. Kara spun first and when it landed on nun, the shouts that rang out to try to beat her to it were loud and fierce and full of laughter and spilled beer.

Alex was next, and she got this intense look on her face while the dreidel spun, like she was calculating exactly how it was going to land. And she probably was.

Maggie was so wildly in love she forgot to shout along with the rest of them to try to beat Alex to it.

James was next, then Winn, who forgot hey momentarily and had to surrender a piece of chocolate with a lot of loud grumbling.

Maggie's turn came and the Superfriends were quiet, contemplating whether they should go easy on her, at least for her first spin. But she called gimel before any of the others had even realized the dreidel had landed, and calmly swept all the chocolate toward herself.

"You… you _traitor_ ," Alex turned to her. "You _memorized_ them all, _easy._ You wanted to be on your own team because you knew you didn't _have_ to practice and could just win right now."

Kara leaned back and kicked out with both feet, laughing hysterically. "I _knew_ it!"

"I'm a detective, Agent Danvers. I detect. That includes a _real_ good memory for random pieces of information. Like, you know, the meaning of the different sides of a dreidel."

Alex watched her with an open mouth, not knowing whether to push her back onto the couch and trap her hands above her head, straddling her and kissing her senseless, or… no. No, that was pretty much the only thing Alex wanted to do, and it must have showed in her eyes, because Maggie's breath hitched and Kara hid her face in her hands and James looked up at the ceiling and Winn ventured, "Down girl."

The sound of her friend's voice jolted her out of her Maggie-induced haze – somewhat – and she grabbed for the dreidel on the table.

"Oh, I'll show you _down_ , Schott," she said, spinning the dreidel for all it was worth as Kara protested that it was her turn next, and Maggie doubled over laughing, laughing, because she had a girlfriend who ran headfirst into everything in her life, including holiday games with family – family – she was included in their family.


	4. Chapter 4

**Teenage surfer Alex wants to cancel Chanukah the first year after Eliza tells the girls that Jeremiah had died in a plane crash. Kara convinces her of the need to keep celebrating life.**

* * *

Alex didn't know who to be angry at. So she was angry at everyone.

She was angry at everyone for months.

A plane crash. A stupid _plane_ crash killed her father. Her dad. Daddy.

Took him from her. The only one who defended her. The only one who understood.

So she was angry. At Eliza. At Kara.

But Kara's wide eyes and trembling bottom lip made it impossible to sustain anger at her.

So she was angry at herself, instead.

And she was angry when the air started developing a chill, when everyone started pretending they liked each other, when everyone started pretending that 'holiday season' meant something other than spending all your money on presents that the other person was just going to be unsatisfied with anyway, on worshipping a god who didn't care, anyway.

Because Jeremiah Danvers was dead, and Alex was angry at everything.

She was angry when she padded downstairs in her bare feet early one Saturday morning, looking for her surf board, because nearly the one things she wasn't angry at these days were the waves and her chemistry set.

She was angry when she found Eliza bent over a small box, meticulously marked _Hanukkah_ , pressing her forehead to the top of the menorah Jeremiah's mother had given him – beautiful, elegant, blue swirls inlaid with silver – and taking a slow, deep, slightly shuddering breath.

"Mom," Alex spoke, and Eliza jumped slightly. "We're not _celebrating_ this year."

Eliza closed her eyes but didn't look at Alex, shook her head but didn't turn toward her. If she had, she would have seen Jeremiah's stance, Jeremiah's courage of conviction, his steadiness, his passion; all mixed with something else that neither of them had, a combination of fury and intellect and dedication that was entirely _Alexandra_ , all wrapped up in the too-rapidly developing body of a teenage girl, breasts starting to protest against her body suit, surf board starting to look sexy rather than cute in her white-knuckled hands.

"Of _course_ we're celebrating this year, Alexandra," Eliza breathed, still not looking at her daughter, still with her head against Jeremiah's cherish menorah, still imagining she could feel his warmth in its cool metal, still imagining that he somehow _wasn't_ suffering in that god-forsaken organization, still imagining that he somehow _wasn't_ miserable and hopeless, _wasn't_ missing them desperately and wishing he were with them on the holiday.

Alex shoved her board from one hand into the other, tucked it smoothly under her arm, and strode forward. Eliza breathed deeply again, allowed herself another moment with her eyes closed, before finally looking up at her glowering daughter.

"How _could_ we, Mom? What's there to celebrate, huh? What _light_? The lights probably went off in that plane while it was crashing – "

" _Alexandra!_ "

"No! No, you can't _make_ me celebrate some stupid holiday for some stupid god who didn't protect Daddy when he needed it. You can't _make_ me do _anything!_ "

"Alexandra, you'll wake your sister – "

"She has _super hearing_ , I could wake her by _breathing_ too loudly – "

"Alex?" Kara's small, groggy voice on top of the stairwell made Eliza glare pointedly at Alex while Alex tossed up the hand that wasn't supporting her surfboard. Eliza stood from her crouch, her knees cracking slightly, and slipped past Alex to head up to where Kara was standing in one of Jeremiah's old t-shirts, eyes wide and tearful.

Alex stared at the menorah Eliza had left on top of the Chanukah box, imagining for a moment the way Jeremiah's fingers would curl around it while he worked the built up wax from last night out of the top so they'd have an easier time setting the candles tonight, the way he'd laugh in easy encouragement as Alex eagerly expounded on the composition of beeswax and how she was thinking it could be used as an anti-inflammatory for when she came home with swollen body parts from wiping out on a rough wave.

She heard Eliza whispering to Kara – _she_ couldn't hear exactly what they were saying, of course, because _she_ didn't have _super_ hearing – and her body went rigid, the warmth from her memories rushing abruptly out of her limbs. She pivoted aggressively on one foot, slipped on her sandals so roughly it stung the pad of skin between her big toe and second toe, and stalked to the back door.

"I'm going out!" she called over her shoulder.

"Don't slam the – "

Alex slammed the door.

* * *

Only the freezing water enveloping her body calmed Alex, soothed her, made her feel less… broken.

She dove and she let her body stay under the surf for as long as she could hold her breath, reveling in the slight burning in her lungs, the crisp saltiness on her lips, the way the ocean caressed her body with a familiarity, an intimacy, that made her think for some reason of Vicky Donahue.

She swallowed and she shoved any thought away.

She searched for the perfect wave.

It must have been hours later that she finally let her eyes scan the shore, empty and abandoned at the early hour she'd come out, starting now to be peppered with people, with other year-long surfers, with families and groups of teenagers huddled in sweatshirts, walking briskly along the sand.

With… Kara.

Her eyes spotted her immediately, standing separate, alone, on the shore, just staring out at Alex. She was too far out to actually _see_ Kara's eyes, but she knew they were wide. She knew they were admiring, and Alex swallowed bitterly: the one thing she could do well – excellently, even – that Kara couldn't.

Well, this and blend in with other humans, but even Alex had trouble with that most of the time.

She blinked water out of her eyes and she tossed her hair out of her face. She raised an arm and she waved. Kara waved back, bouncing on her toes, and Alex couldn't help but grin. She held up a finger to Kara, knowing she could see the specificity of the gesture even from way back there, and she looked for one last wave.

She found it, and she rode it, a smug smile in her eyes, her tongue peaking out from between her lips. Nothing else mattered, nothing else but the roaring curve of the massive sheet of water that surrounded her, surrounded her but wouldn't touch her, wouldn't hurt her, wouldn't envelop her, because she _knew_ the wave, she _knew_ its rhythm and its constant rage. She _shared_ its rhythm and its constant rage.

"That was _amazing,_ Alex!" Kara was shouting as her sister finally splashed her way out of the water, panting slightly and grinning at the group of girls behind Kara who were watching her, who were biting their lips and giggling and making Alex feel warm inside. She tossed the hair out of her face and her body keened when it set the girls giggling again, but she ignored it, she ignored everything, she had to, because Kara was there, because Kara was smiling and clapping her hands but her eyes were red, like she'd been crying, and Alex knew, _again_ , that it had been her fault.

"You okay?" she asked when she was within regular human hearing range, reaching her dripping hand toward Kara but not quite touching her, not wanting to get her wet.

"Are _you_ okay?" Kara redirected, and Alex swallowed, glancing back at the ocean longingly, wishing she were still out there. Wishing she never had to come back to the shore.

"I'm sorry I woke you," Alex ignored the question.

"It's okay, I was already up." They started trudging back up the beach together, and Alex notices for the first time that Kara has two towels rolled up in her hands. She gives one to Alex, who's already starting to shiver, and she lays one out on the sand for them both to sit on.

If Kara were her regular sister – her _human_ sister – she'd be concerned that Kara would get cold in the ocean-chilled December air. But Kara _wasn't_ her regular sister, _wasn't_ her human sister, so Alex just sighed and collapsed next to her, sticking her board up in the sand behind them.

"Eliza says you don't want to have Chanukah this year," Kara said in a small voice.

"You mean you heard with your super hearing that I don't want to have Chanukah this year."

Kara bit the inside of her cheek and looked down, and Alex immediately felt terrible. "I was just teasing, Kara, I'm sorry. I – right. It just doesn't feel right without him here. To celebrate anything."

Kara was quiet for a long time. She stared out at the waves for a long time. Alex watched her carefully, watched her face go from thoughtful to sad to angry to lonely to miserable to hopeful, the only change recognizable through those blue, blue eyes.

"My Aunt Astra used to say that we have to celebrate _because_ life has so much sadness in it. If you don't stop and let yourself celebrate, you'll just be… _sad_ all the time."

Alex's heart constricted, and her fists clenched where they were dangled between her legs, her elbows resting on her drawn knees. How could she be so selfish? She'd lost Jeremiah, yes, it was awful, yes, but Kara had lost her _whole planet_ , her whole _family_ , every single person she'd _ever_ known.

And here Alex was, whining because her mom wanted to celebrate a holiday – wanted to go on living – without Jeremiah.

Alex was supposed to be better than this. Stronger than this. Less selfish than this. And she would be.

"Are _you_ sad all the time?" she asked Kara, and her little sister turned to look at her with grave eyes and slightly upturned lips.

"Not when I'm with you."

Alex told herself that the stinging in her eyes was from the salt water, and she told herself that the aching in her heart was from the workout she'd just had.

She shifted closer to her little sister and put her arm around her, drawing her into her chest – wetness and coldness be damned, she was Kryptonian, she'd be fine – and kissed the top of her head.

"Happy Chanukah, Kara."

"Happy Chanukah, Alex."


	5. Chapter 5

_**Maggie's first menorah lighting with Alex, Kara, Winn, James, and Eliza.**_

* * *

Maggie Sawyer came out at twelve years old in small town Nebraska; and by small town, she means population of three hundred something, mostly white, except for her extended family.

Maggie Sawyer beat up her first boy at thirteen years old, when he was seventeen, because he told her cousin that she was asking for it when she went out looking _like that_.

Maggie Sawyer was the only girl in her high school graduating class – her high school that featured her getting shoved into lockers, her enduring endless racial slurs and just as many offers to help her _find the right guy_ – who left Blue Springs, who went to college, who made a life for herself outside of the place where everyone knew her name, third grade teacher, and which bedroom window was hers.

Maggie Sawyer joined a racist, homophobic police force to try to make it better from within.

Maggie Sawyer made detective within four years.

Maggie Sawyer battled aliens alongside the DEO; and protected them from it, too.

Maggie Sawyer was, in a word, tough.

Maggie Sawyer was also shaking like a leaf, pacing the hallway outside her the door of her girlfriend's little sister. Because Maggie had never celebrated Chanukah, and she'd certainly never celebrated Chanukah with her new girlfriend's _mother_.

It was Kara who noticed. _Of course_ it was Kara who noticed; no one else could see straight through the wall. No one else could hear Maggie sighing, Maggie muttering to herself that she could do this, that this was nothing, that Eliza was _nice_ , that Alex's friends _liked_ her, that Alex was… _perfect._ That it wouldn't turn out like it always did. And that yes, her fly was zipped and her breath suitably minty.

Kara smiled slightly and touched Eliza's shoulders as she passed behind her and Winn to softly pad to the door, glad Alex was distracted by her animated conversation with James about DEO policy.

"Maggie?" she said softly, slipping outside the apartment and half closing the door behind her. Maggie jumped, bringing her left hand under her lower lip.

"Kara! Hey. I was just about to – "

"It's okay if you're nervous, Maggie."

Maggie stopped pacing and leveled her gaze at Alex's kid sister, who was regarding her with compassionate concern and an overflowing of a certain emotion that Maggie couldn't quite identify, but she thought might be gratitude.

"Eliza's really excited to meet you, you know. And Alex can't stop talking about how happy she is that you agreed to come. I've never seen her like this, Maggie. Especially around a holiday. She always… since her dad… she's always been pretty withdrawn around holidays, since we were teenagers. But now…"

Kara glanced back over her shoulder, squinting slightly to see Alex through the door, checking her phone and all but bouncing on the balls of her feet, waiting for Maggie to knock on the door.

"I just want to make her happy, Little Danvers."

"You do, Maggie. Now come on. It's almost sunset. Alex told you that's when we light the menorah?"

Maggie nodded, breathing in deeply, her knuckles starting to ache with how tightly she was gripping the bag of goodies she brought.

"Wait!" she told Kara before she opened the door. From her bag, she withdrew one bouquet of roses and another arrangement, a wild mix of colors and textures and flowers Kara couldn't identify. Kara beamed, and Maggie nodded, looking slightly like she was going to be sick.

Kara grasped her forearm briefly and opened the door.

"Look who I found!" she announced.

"Eeeeyyyy!" Winn and James shouted, raising their beers at Maggie from their sprawls on and against the couch.

Alex beamed and strode over, pulling Maggie into a much more chaste hug than she would have if Eliza weren't over, if she wasn't shaking at the idea of touching her girlfriend, _having_ a girlfriend, under her mother's watchful eyes. James and Winn snickered, and Kara grinned at the ground.

"For you," Maggie told her softly, holding the roses out for Alex.

" _Maggie_ ," Alex breathed, her eyes stinging and a lump suddenly flaring up in her throat. Maggie beamed at her, took a deep, steadying breath, and turned to a waiting Eliza.

"Maggie Sawyer, Dr. Danvers." She held out the hand that wasn't occupied with the other bouquet and bag, but Eliza ignored it, pulling her into a hug.

"It's a true pleasure to meet you when you aren't lying in a bio bed in need of stitches, Maggie," Eliza told her, and Kara tugged a teary-eyed Alex into her side.

"Um, happy Chanukah," Maggie said, holding out the bouquet when Eliza pulled back.

Eliza beamed over Maggie's head at Alex, and Maggie gulped. "They're beautiful, dear, thank you."

"Thank you for having me," Maggie answered with a slight bow of her head, and Kara bounced forward.

"Technically _I'm_ the hostess," she announced, and Maggie laughed.

"And I didn't forget it." She dove into her bag and pulled out a large tray covered in foil.

Kara squealed. "What is it, what is it!?"

"Well, Alex told me something about jelly donuts, so… I made you some."

"Oh my _god_ ," Kara said, grabbing the tray and darting into the kitchen with it. James and Winn shot up, eager to get at Maggie's cooking before Kara could shove it all in her mouth.

Eliza laughed. "You certainly know how to charm the Danvers women," she touched Maggie's arm, and a deep blush rose in Maggie's chest.

"Ey, 'aggie," Winn said through a mouthful of homemade donut. "Erargifs?"

"Say again?" Alex teased.

Winn took an almighty swallow and sighed. "Where's _our_ gifts?" he teased.

Maggie grinned and went into her bag one more time, lifting out two identical boxes.

"Wait, what?! I didn't actually _mean_ it!"

"Well, some of us are actually _thoughtful_ , Schott," Maggie laughed as she chucked the boxes over the counter at James, who caught them deftly with a smile and passed one to Winn.

"Are we lighting?" Eliza asked before Winn could tear into the blue wrapping – which, he would discover later, contained an ugly Chanukah sweater featuring dancing dreidels for him, and an ugly Christmas sweater containing dancing reindeers for James.

"Yeah!" Kara said, and Alex swallowed and looked at the ground with a deep, deep breath.

Maggie grimaced and took her hand. "You good, babe?"

"We'll get him home soon," Alex answered, and Maggie nodded grimly.

Alex led Maggie to the kitchen table, where an elegant blue and silver menorah glinted in the low lights of Kara's apartment. James and Winn quieted and slipped over to the table, and Kara burrowed into Eliza's side.

"So," Winn leaned into Maggie softly. "You light a candle each night, and pray over them; three blessings the first night, but only the first."

Maggie nodded gratefully and Winn smiled at her.

Alex's hand shook on the book of matches James passed her, and Maggie tentatively took it from her. "My dad used to do this. I… I took over the year he… Let's make this the last year we light without him, yeah?"

"Amen," Eliza and Winn whispered, while Kara just nodded with closed eyes and James put a hand on Alex's shoulder.

Maggie kissed her jawline softly, nervously, and Eliza beamed at her.

"Ready babe?"

Alex nodded, and – by unspoken agreement between them – Maggie struck the match for her. To her surprise, Alex held the bottom of the candle over it first, waiting until the wax started dripping so she could stick it securely into the menorah.

Maggie watched her slightly trembling fingers, otherwise always so steady, in awe, in admiration. Eliza watched Maggie watch Alex and exchanged a glance with Kara, who nodded a silent affirmation, a silent agreement, at her.

Alex took a deep breath, glanced at the sky, and used the shamash, the center candle, to kindle the other.

"Baruch atah, Adonoi Eloheinu, Melech haolam." She paused as her voice trembled, threatened to break, threatened to spill over into the tears, the fresh grief, the fresh rage, of doing this, of leading this, with Jeremiah not dead, just captive, not dead, just an experiment; Maggie laced their fingers together as the candle sparked. "Asher kid'shanu b'mitzvotav v'tsivanu l'hadlik ner shel Chanukah."

Her wavering voice broke completely on the very last syllable, and the look that Maggie was beginning to recognize as Alex's 'worrying about Jeremiah' expression washed over her face so intensely that Maggie's heart threatened to break.

She lifted gentle fingers to stroke Alex's cheek, to brush back the strands of hair that had fallen forward into her face, and Winn whispered the translation. "Blessed are you, Adonai our God, Sovereign of all, who hallows us with mitzvoth – uh, commandments – commanding us to kindle the Chanukah lights."

Maggie tilted her head at him, a fond but surprised smile on her face, brow slightly furrowed; she'd assumed his knowledge from earlier was from the last year of celebrating with the Danvers, nothing more.

He grinned softly at her impressed, curious face. "My mom raised a good Jewish boy before she left me with my Christian dad in prison." He grimaced, and Kara shifted to lean into his chest; he tilted his cheek to rest on his best friend's hair.

Alex's voice grew stronger throughout the next two blessings; Kara translated the first while Eliza translated the third, and Maggie and James exchanged a warm glance at the way they were so utterly enveloped in the circle around them.

A silence settled amongst the family – _family_ , Maggie thought, and Alex drew her close into her body as a shiver coursed through her veins – as the translation of the final blessing slipped past Eliza's lips, and the flickering of the first night's candles was the only sound in the apartment.

James thought about Kara, about his dad, about redemption and about freedom in an unfree place.

Winn prayed on his mother, thought about Kara, about forgiveness and about what it means to change the world.

Kara offered thanks to Rao, prayed on the warmth of the night, about flying and about her sister finally doing just that.

Eliza reflected on her daughters, on Alex, on healing and on the little surfer scientist becoming the soldier scientist, with a relaxed stance and sober smile for the first time in over a decade.

Alex meditated on her father, on Maggie, on the strength flowing into her veins from the fingers laced in hers, on mending and on fighting and on trust.

Maggie let her mind settle on Alex, on her niece, on the silence of the night, on the beauty of another language shaping the tongue of her beloved.

Each of them prayed on family, prayed on faith, prayed on belief, prayed on hope.

It took the candles hours to melt down into a memory, but the feelings they'd awoken would last much, much longer.


	6. Chapter 6

_**Eliza uses the first night of Chanukah to ask Maggie about her intentions with her daughter, ft. a super-hearing Kara making latkes and a very love-professing Maggie.**_

 _This one continues more or less directly from the previous chapter – Night 5 – so check that out if you want the mood of the night set for you!_

* * *

"So technically, you're supposed to have all the food ready beforehand, but you know – National City's alien populace doesn't schedule their attacks around menorah lightings, so Alex and I got home late."

Maggie gave a grateful smile for Kara's careful explanation for the food she was preparing, for Winn's whispers to unveil the reasons behind the unfamiliar traditions, for Eliza's warm, steady glances at the way Maggie poured Alex wine and water, for Alex's hand never leaving her own, for James's glances of solidarity to remind her that she wasn't the only one experiencing new things, that she wasn't stupid for not knowing.

"Maggie, why don't you come help me set out these beautiful donuts you made?" Eliza called from the table, and Alex's eyes flew wide and her hand gripped Maggie's harder. A small squeak escaped Alex's lips, and she turned, terrified, to Kara for help. Kara, rinsing potatoes for her famous homemade latkes, let the scalding water run unnoticed under her hands until James reached over to turn off the tap.

Eliza waited with a raised eyebrow and small smile, pretending she didn't see the panic striking the faces of her two girls and their friends.

"It's fine, babe," Maggie whispered, not wanting to let Alex know that it _wasn't_ fine, that her heart was threatening to slam out of her chest and punch her in the face, that she was nauseous and she was terrified and she was a badass police officer, dammit, she could set the table with this woman's _mother._

Alex let go of her hand reluctantly, Winn and Kara each prying at her fingers and taking hold of one of her arms each to prevent her from following Maggie, to prevent her eyes from bulging out of her head at the sight of Maggie alone with Eliza, to prevent her from going straight for the bottle of bourbon, which so far she hadn't resorted to tonight.

"So Maggie," Eliza began as Maggie approached the table. "Alex tells me you work for the science division of the police department here," she offered lightly as she gathered up the donuts Kara hadn't yet devoured – Maggie had had the foresight to make several extra batches – and passed Maggie a couple of serving plates to arrange them on.

"Yes, ma'am. I was fast-tracked to detective because of my background in chemistry and biology."

"So you can follow at least some of what my daughter goes on about?"

Maggie grinned nervously and glanced over at Alex, who was still shooting wide-eyed glances over her shoulder as though she was expecting Eliza to transform into a homicidal alien – or maybe just a homicidal human mother – at any moment.

"A bit, yeah," Maggie laughed.

"And you realize that she's never truly been in love before." Eliza's hands were still, now, as they reached the real point of the conversation, and Maggie looked up, face frozen. Across the room, Kara, too, froze, her super hearing gluing her in place.

"Yes, ma'am." Maggie's voice was small, and her eyes drifted to where Winn and James were valiantly distracting Alex, making her cover her blushing face with her hands, shake her head, and laugh.

"And you realize what an intense position that puts you in."

"Dr. Danvers, I…" Maggie licked her lips, swallowed, and let her eye settle on the potatoes that Kara had been skinning, knife frozen now, still. Waiting. "Your daughter… she isn't like anyone I've ever met before. She's…" They both looked over at Alex, now hitting James lightly on the shoulder as he continued whatever strategy of making her laugh that he and Winn had decided would best maintain her attention and keep her hands away from a bottle of liquor to cope with Eliza shovel talking Maggie not ten feet behind her.

"She's sharp, she doesn't miss a trick. She's passionate and she's brave and she's selfless and she's… damn, she's ruthless and she's absolutely…" Maggie's voice threatened to break, and she forced herself to look Eliza square in the eyes. "She's absolutely beautiful, and not just on the outside. I've never…" Maggie paused again, searching for the right words. Her eyes fell on the flickering lights on the menorah, and she took a deep breath. "It's like these candles, right? Hope, light, in the midst of all-encompassing darkness, in the midst of impossible odds? That's… that's your daughter. For me. She's everything, and I won't… Dr. Danvers, I'm not going to let her down. I'd _die_ for her, I… I love her. I _love_ Alex, Dr. Danvers, and I just… I'm rambling now, but I just… I love her. I'll take care of her. _Both_ of your girls. I promise."

A loud thud and crashing in the sink had both Maggie and Alex reaching for their guns, but it was just Kara, Kara covered in potato skins and starch, Kara whose super hearing had her wishing they'd just bought pre-made latkes because at this rate, she'd be lucky if she could keep her over-excited, shaking hands steady enough to finish peeling, let alone grating, mixing, and frying.

" _Sorry_ ," she whispered, and Eliza sighed loudly, shaking her head with a faint smile.

"How many times have I cautioned you against eavesdropping, Kara Danvers?"

Alex leaned in and pointed at Kara, booping her nose, hard. " _Ha!_ You got _scolded_."

" _Ha!_ You have a girlfriend that _loves_ you!"

Alex gasped slightly and turned to a slack-jawed, wide-eyed Maggie; Winn clapped his hands with excitement; Eliza covered her face with her hand; and James furrowed his brow.

"Kara… Kara, you know that didn't make sense as a comeback, like… at all, right?"

Kara beamed around at the wide eyes of her family, at the way Alex was slowly crossing the room, tears brimming in her eyes, to bring Maggie into her arms, to bring her lips hot and open against hers, and continued grating potatoes smugly.

"Might not have made sense as a comeback, but it sure made my sister's Chanukah."


	7. Chapter 7

An angsty college Alex reluctantly comes home from Stanford for an explosive, emotional Chanukah with Eliza, Kara, and the memory of Jeremiah.

* * *

Alex had wanted to spend the weekend in Oakland with the girl from her organic chemistry class who always wore these low cut shirts and tight jeans and had invited her to a talk on a clinical trial on gene splicing in embryonic stem cells. Truth be told, Alex had already seen the lead researcher give a talk, and she hadn't been terribly impressed; she'd have been more so if he'd been working with adult stem cells, and if he hadn't been so damn full of himself.

But this girl with those shirts and those jeans had bit her lip when she asked her and she was talking about making a road trip out of it and Alex's breath had hitched and she didn't know why but she liked it…

And then Kara had called.

It wasn't Kara's fault, not really.

Alex blamed Eliza. Sending Kara as her messenger.

"She really misses you, Alex, and she's sad you're not coming home for Chanukah. I mean, I miss you, too, but I see you practically every weekend… She just misses you, Alex, especially around the holiday, without Jeremiah – "

"Mom's not sad I'm not coming home, Kara, she's sad she won't have her whipping girl there to scold like I'm a child for not calling enough, for you getting that A minus last week, for not being graduated already, for you getting a hangnail – "

"Alex, she's not trying to fight with you. She does, she misses you. And I miss you. You already missed the first two nights: but it's the weekend now, and we can have a good time. Come home."

Alex thought about the girl from orgo and she thought about Kara's pout. She thought about a road trip driving next to this girl who bit her lip when she talked to her and she thought about Eliza's latest string of reprimands: "People balance their family responsibilities with their schooling all the time, Alexandra; how else do you think I wrote my dissertation with two teenage girls in the house? You need to find a way to spend less time distracted and more time making sure Kara isn't getting into trouble; she's only a freshman and you know the pressures of freshman year, Lord knows you succumbed to enough of them."

She thought about Kara's inability to get drunk and her wide eyes last time she described the aggressiveness of college boys, and she thought about Jeremiah's small smile the first time he walked into the kitchen to see Alex teaching Kara how to make latkes.

She pinched the bridge of her nose, breathed deeply, and sighed.

"Alright, I'll get the next train out. See you soon."

The girl from orgo class went to the talk with a busty blonde instead, and Alex forced any further rumination on the whole thing out of her mind.

* * *

"My darling girl!" Eliza cried as she opened the door, Alex still fumbling in her duffle bag for her keys. "Why didn't you call me, I would have picked you up from the station!" Eliza's excited voice was muffled over Alex's shoulder as she pulled her into a hug.

Alex stiffened but smiled weakly and brought a slow arm around Eliza, breathing in vanilla and that indefinable scent of home.

"I like the walk," Alex shrugged as Eliza released her.

Truth was, she needed it to settle her racing heart.

Truth was, she needed it to clear her head, to give her a transition between studying on the train: being the unshakeable, top-of-the-class-at-Stanford woman who's got it all together, who goes running in nothing but her Stanford sports bra and basketball shorts every morning at five a.m. before heading to the lab, always six and a half steps ahead of everyone else – and seeing Eliza: being the unsteady, unstable, too-much-alcohol-drinking, why-would-you-do-it-that-way-when-this-way-is-so-much-better little girl that she felt like around her mother.

"Alex!"

The two syllables of her own name, accompanied by the rapid pounding of feet pattering down the stairs, set her entire body more at ease, sent her entire being into a state of knowing everything would – somehow, despite all the evidence to the contrary – be alright.

"Sis," she barely had time to breathe before her little sister had replaced Eliza in her arms. As she usually did when they went more than a week or so without seeing each other, Kara cracked Alex's spine a little with the force of her hug, but Alex found she didn't mind, and she burrowed her forehead into Kara's neck.

Kara ran her fingers briefly through Alex's long, long hair, hoping she was breathing some comfort into her: she could feel the racing of her big sister's pulse, could feel how quickly, how hard, her blood was pounding through her veins, how much adrenaline her system was flooded with.

She pulled apart from Alex abruptly and grabbed her duffel. "Latkes! Come!"

Kara nearly dislocated Alex's shoulder with the eagerness with which she yanked her off into the kitchen, and Eliza shook her head and laughed as her girls giggled their way into the mist of hot oil and grated potatoes that layered the kitchen.

* * *

"How's everything in the lab, Alex? Kara tells me you've become the lead undergraduate researcher – something you didn't see fit to tell me?"

Alex shrugged and took a long, long gulp of wine while Kara lowered her eyes and Eliza arched an eyebrow.

"Well, Mom, the lead undergrad researcher barely gets a footnotes mention in the publications, so I didn't think it'd be – "

"But you're the one doing most of the work! Didn't you say you were the one discovering all those geneti-whatsits?"

"Genetic markers, Kara, and yeah, sure, but that doesn't – "

"That's a tremendous accomplishment, Alex. I'd have thought you'd be proud to tell me, especially as it would help me understand why you've had so much less time to support Kara's transition to college this semester – "

Alex held her breath and poured herself more wine.

"Oh, no, Eliza, Alex has been – "

"Drinking like it's Purim instead of Chanukah, and all before we even had the chance to light, I see. Are you going to be able to remember the blessings, Alexandra, or do you intend to slur your way through the prayers your father used to lead?"

Alex stood somewhat unsteadily, wishing Kara hadn't called, wishing she'd gone to that stupid talk with that girl from orgo, wishing she were back in her lab, wishing she were anywhere, anywhen, but here.

"Kara, can you leave us alone? Just for a minute?"

"Alex, I don't think that's such a – "

"It's alright, Kara. Alexandra clearly needs to get some things off her chest. Go on, I'm sure this won't take long before she passes out from all that wine."

"Alex – "

"It's fine, Kara, I'll come upstairs to get you before we light, okay?"

"Alex – "

"Okay?"

Kara stared between Eliza and Alex, worrying her bottom lip, before she scraped her chair back and darted up the stairs, tears clouding her eyes.

Alex watched her go with a steady glare that was meant for Eliza, not Kara, and the moment she disappeared over the top of the stairs, Alex started in.

"You know what, Mom, you're right. A lot of alcohol for the massive failure. Maybe I do have the wrong holiday. Hell, if it were Purim, maybe I could throw on an argyle sweater and x-ray vision canceling glasses – wouldn't that be the perfect costume? Alexandra Danvers, dressed as the daughter you'd so clearly prefer?"

Eliza has stood by this point, too, nostrils flaring, shaking her head.

"Why must you _do_ this, Alexandra? Take every holiday and turn it into a battlefield?"

"Oh," Alex laughs dryly, gesturing at Eliza with her sloshing glass of red wine, "okay, I get it. I get it. You're gonna object to me _ruining_ another holiday, but _not_ to the idea that Kara's your favorite daughter?"

"Forgive me if I choose not to respond to such _clearly_ ludicrous suggestions, Alexandra – "

"Oh, it's _ludicrous_ , now I'm _ludicrous_ , okay. You know what, this is just _perfect._ I could have been at a talk in Oakland, I could have – you know I came here because Kara said you _missed_ me, wanted to spend the _holiday_ with me, but you know what Mom? I'm sorry. I'm sorry I'm not Kara and I'm _sorry_ I'm not Dad. I've tried to be both for so long, for _you_ , and apparently when I'm _trying_ to just be _me_ , it's not enough. So you know what?"

She grabbed a book of matches and stalked to the menorah, to Jeremiah's old menorah, to the one that used to make his face light up and his laughter ring louder.

"Kara!" she shouted upstairs as Eliza just watched her daughter, struck silent, silent, silent.

A tentative Kara padded down the stairs, and the moment she saw her, Alex struck a match and lit the bottom of the shamash until the wax started melting down.

"Baruch atah, Adonai Eloheinu, Melech haolam, asher kid'shanu b'mitzvotav v'tsivanu l'hadlik ner shel Chanukah," she rapid-fired, glaring up at Eliza as trembling hands lit each candle, glaring as she successfully navigated the Hebrew without slurring, without Anglicizing the cheit, keeping it strongly in her throat, nearly slamming the semi-melted bottoms of each candle into their proper spots.

"There. We celebrated. Happy Chanukah. I'm going out."

Eliza sighed and lowered her head, Kara breathed Alex's name but knew there'd be no point trying to stop her, and Alex stormed to the back door, grabbing her surf board, kicking off the heeled sandals she tended to put on around Eliza, and slamming the door behind her.

* * *

Alex didn't return until long after it became to dark to safely surf; until long after the freezing water had her shivering; until long after Kara had settled herself on the shore, knees curled into her chest, watching Alex forlornly; until long after the stars had come out, long after the sight of the Orion Nebula above the glint of the ocean calmed Alex's raging blood somewhat.

"I shouldn't have encouraged you to come home," Kara apologized as Alex emerged from the ocean at last, board tucked under her arm, the only indication that she saw her – or cared – was the slight slowing in her pace to allow Kara to scramble up and follow her off the beach.

Kara tossed a towel over Alex's dripping shoulders, and Alex grimaced her thanks at her.

"It's not your fault, Kara." Her voice was distant, hollow, but it at least lacked the bitterness it had dripped with earlier in the evening.

The girls said nothing else as they trudged back to the house, and Eliza said nothing as she looked up to see them slipping through the back door. Kara grimaced a greeting at her, but Alex looked past her as she settled her board down and doubled up the stairs. Kara followed.

Alex slipped into Stanford sweats and climbed up onto the roof from her old bedroom window, leaving it wide open for Kara to join her. When she finally did – it took longer than Alex had expected, and she grabbed at the opportunity to lay on the roof with her hands behind her head, mapping the stars with her eyes – Kara was balancing two steaming mugs of coffee and a heaping plate of latkes and jelly donuts.

"Thought you'd be hungry after all that surfing," Kara said in a small voice, and Alex chuckled dryly.

"Plus you were hungry after spending all that time foodless on the beach watching me."

Kara smiled sheepishly and passed Alex, sitting up now, the plate so she could settle down next to her.

"How's Mom?" Alex asked after two latkes, a few deep gulps of coffee, and half a jelly donut.

"Sad. A bit angry. But she loves you, Alex. She mostly just wants to make sure you're okay."

Alex glanced sidelong at her sister. She would be angry with her – furious – if she didn't know that Kara defended Alex to Eliza in the same way that she was now defending Eliza to Alex. She just never wanted anyone to be angry with each other, Kara. So Alex just shrugged and shoved the rest of her donut into Kara's eager mouth.

"I was just apologizing to Dad," Alex told her in a defeated voice, laying back down and nodded up at the stars. "For rushing through the blessing like that. For lighting with that kind of bitterness."

Kara stared at Alex for a long moment before lying down next to her, balancing her coffee mug and the food plate on her stomach.

"Jeremiah would understand."

Alex sighed long and hard. "You think it'd be okay to light them again? The… right way?"

"Tonight?"

Alex turned her head to stare into Kara's blue eyes. "Yeah."

Kara grinned and sat up on her elbows.

"Let's do it."

Alex nodded softly, heaving another sigh at the sky. She took the plate of food from Kara while she clambered back through Alex's bedroom window, and passed it ahead of her as she did the same, spilling some coffee on her fingers but not particularly minding, relishing the burning feeling.

"Mom," Alex called as they trooped downstairs. "We're gonna light again. Properly. Wanna come do it with us?"

Eliza closed her eyes from her reclined position on the couch, inhaling heavily and the corners of her mouth twitching into a grateful smile. It was the closest her daughter was going to get to an apology tonight: Jeremiah would have accepted it, and so would she.

"I'd love that, sweetheart."

And she did.


	8. Chapter 8

**Alright folks, that wraps it up for this series! I hope you enjoyed!**

 **I'm going to get back to working on I Didn't Know You were Into Girls on here and on Ao3 (same username), and I've started to post my Sanvers minifics on Ao3 in a collection called The Girls We Wanna Kiss.**

 **Thank you so much to the folks who suggested and supported this collection: it was a wonderful way for me to explore my Jewish side (raised both Jewish and Catholic), and a great way to honor the Jewish history of Superman/Supergirl! Also, it was reallllly fun writing backstory for Alex - I think I need to do more of that... but without further ado!**

 ** _Jeremiah's first Chanukah back with the family since he was taken by Cadmus, ft. heavy Maggie and Eliza bonding time and Jeremiah walking in on Alex and Maggie._**

* * *

The blessings had been said – Alex had nearly broken Maggie's fingers with how hard she squeezed them to keep control, to keep from sobbing, to keep from breaking, as her trembling voice rose with Jeremiah's as she helped him light for the first time in over a decade – and the latkes had been demolished (mostly by Kara).

Maggie had stepped into the hall to take a work call – she had a court date in the morning to testify on behalf of a kid who'd been unjustly profiled – and when she slipped back inside, she found Jeremiah on the couch with his girls, Eliza standing behind them, distantly, by the table, her shoulders shaking, her face contorted slightly with the effort of not breaking down.

"Dr. Danvers?" Maggie asked, her fingers trembling only slightly on her wine glass.

Alex had told her a lot about her mom – first that she'd taken her coming out better than Alex had, but later, that Alex rarely ever felt enough for her, that she valued Kara's safety, Kara's health, Kara's happiness, above Alex's, that it had had a strange and difficult and unfamiliar and afterthought type feeling the one time her mother had told her to take care of _herself_ – and it left Maggie halfway between feeling rage toward the woman and a sense of affection, a deep knowledge that for all the grief she'd caused Alex, their love for each other also ran deeply; that if Eliza didn't show Alex how intensely she loved her, it wasn't because she didn't – it was because she didn't know _how_.

And here the woman was, standing next to the menorah with one hand delicately resting on the table – one hand delicately, subtly, holding her up, keeping her steady, holding her balance – as she stared across the room at her long lost husband; at her adopted daughter, laughing and smiling and shaking her head as Jeremiah teased her; at her eldest daughter, shoulders shaking with laughter and, they both suspected, with tears.

At her eldest daughter, who had at 15 assumed the role of both father and sister in the house, never explicitly, never intentionally, but by default, because Alex was Alex, and – Kara had told Maggie that Jeremiah had said this – she had always been too strong for her own good.

Eliza didn't hear Maggie the first time, so absorbed she was in staring at her reunited family, at the man she had said was dead so many times she almost started to believe it herself. Only to discover a year later that he _was_ dead; only to discover a decade later that he _wasn't_ ; at the man who had been her ghost, her invisible confidant, her measuring stick upon which she judged her relationship with Alex (and always failed) and her commitment to Kara (and succeeded, albeit at Alex's expense, because god damn it all if Eliza was going to let Jeremiah's sacrifice for Kara go to waste. She wondered, sometimes, if she had simply _told_ Alex that Jeremiah had left _for_ Kara, had essentially given his _life_ for Kara, if Alex would have understood why Eliza put so much pressure on her to take care of Kara, to honor Jeremiah's sacrifice. She wondered, knowing what she knew now, whether and when Alex would put those pieces together on her own, and if it would lead her to understand Eliza just a little bit better).

"Dr. Danvers?" Maggie tried again.

Eliza started and turned toward Maggie with a genuine but distant smile on her face.

"It's Eliza, dear. You helped save my long dead husband's life: I daresay you've earned it."

Maggie smiled lopsidedly. "Yes ma'am."

Eliza chuckled softly, wondering if it had ever been possible that Alex _wouldn't_ fall in love with this woman.

"I just… are you alright?" Maggie asked, and Eliza's smile wavered. She regarded Maggie, considered her, for a long, long moment. Maggie held her gaze unwaveringly.

"You know, Maggie, Alexandra… Alexandra became the rock of the family after Jeremiah was taken by Cadmus – after Jeremiah _sacrificed_ himself to Cadmus – she… she cared for Kara and she… she cared for _me._ She was angry. Oh lord, she was angry."

Eliza stared down into the flickering menorah candles, remembering all the years Alex had raged through Chanukah, had drank through Chanukah, had scorned and glared and kicked and screamed her way through Chanukah, because it had always been Jeremiah's holiday and Jeremiah was gone and Alex was angry.

"But she also… did you know that there were days, entire days, that I would lock myself in my room after they took him, after I had to pretend to my children that my husband was dead – meanwhile knowing that he wasn't dead, but was perhaps enduring a worse fate, all for the sake of his family; and then of course I was told he actually _was_ dead, but I couldn't tell anyone, I couldn't mourn, because they had done their fresh mourning a year earlier… I would lock myself in my room and tell the girls that I was working on my dissertation. But Alex would always know, somehow, always, when I wasn't truly working. When I was laying in bed, staring at the ceiling, wondering where he was, wondering if he was suffering, wondering what kinds of god-awful experiments they were making him do, they were doing to him."

Maggie lowered her eyes. When they rescued him, they'd rescued others, too, humans and aliens alike that they'd found along the way to him, and those experiments… Maggie was still waking up with nightmares.

Eliza swallowed, and continued.

"There were days when I couldn't move at all. And Alexandra… Alex somehow, always knew. Always, every time. And she would pick the lock on my door and she would crawl into bed with me and she would hold me. She would wrap her arms around my waist – she was getting so strong even by then, all that surfing – and she would just lay there with me. Or sometimes she would just read, you know, she'd bring one of her massive textbooks into my room and just prop it open on my pillow and read next to me, muttering to herself in that way that she does when she's thinking hard."

Maggie smiled, picturing it. She could see it easily: Alex still had the same exact habit, her knees bent, feet in the air, swinging absently as she absorbed herself in genetics, in astrophysics, in Murakami's latest novel.

"Until I found the strength to get up, until I siphoned hers off and took it in as my own. And neither of us would say anything about it, and she would go back to being her raging, angry teenage self like it never happened, like she didn't know I was depressed, but she… she would get me through those days, Maggie. And now, now that Jeremiah's back, now that _she_ , and you, got him back, I… it occurs to me that I never thanked her. That I spent most of her life not appreciating her, not thanking her enough. And I don't… I don't think I know how."

But Eliza hadn't noticed that Alex had frozen halfway into their conversation; that Jeremiah had stilled, that Kara had stiffened and put her hand on Alex's thigh. Eliza hadn't noticed that Alex had heard nearly every word.

Maggie backed away quietly, smilingly, as Alex stood from the couch as if in a daze; as Alex walked toward her mother as though moving through molasses; as Alex clinked down her bottle of beer and pulled her mother into a long, teary, shuddering hug.

Maggie padded softly toward the couch and perched on the edge of it, Kara extending a hand to her knee and squeezing.

"Thank you, Maggie," she whispered, and Maggie shrugged.

"I didn't do anything."

"Eliza doesn't open up like that to just anyone. You must have made quite an impression on her, young lady," Jeremiah told her, a faint smile on his face, but he wasn't looking at her; he was looking at his wife and at his daughter, at his too strong daughter letting herself cry in her mommy's arms, and he knew without having to ask that it was long overdue.

Maggie's jeans vibrated and she slipped off the couch, grimacing an apology at Kara and Jeremiah, casting another glance at Alex, still shaking in Eliza's arms.

"It's work, I'm sorry – " Maggie apologized.

But Kara just smiled and nodded toward her bedroom, and Maggie slipped inside and closed the door behind her.

"Sawyer."

* * *

Twenty minutes later, Maggie was still on the phone.

Perched on the edge of Kara's bed, elbows resting between wide spread knees, she listened patiently as the boy she was testifying for tomorrow nearly hyperventilated through his fears, through his terrors, through his anxieties; she talked him down from the worst of them and she helped him, again, practice everything he would need to say, reminded him of exactly what his lawyer had, of every single thing that would happen, that would be said, so he would know, so he wouldn't be thrown off guard.

She had him laughing, now, talking about some cute thing his little sister had done that day, and she could tell he'd be calmer, now, that he'd be able to get the good night's sleep he needed, now.

"You're gonna be amazing, Danny, alright? Yeah. Of course, man. Yeah. Yeah, tell her the cop lady says hi. Yeah. Alright Dannny. I'll see you in the morning. Yeah. Anytime. Night."

Maggie clicked out of the call and she hung her head slightly, heaving a long, slow sigh.

"That the boy you're testifying for in the morning?" Alex's voice sounded softly, and Maggie jumped slightly.

Alex was hanging her head through the doorway, a small smile on her face, eyes wide and seeking permission to come into the room.

Maggie stood and smiled, tension dissipating almost immediately from her shoulders. "Yeah, he was just nervous, wanted to talk about it. Sorry I slipped away for so long, I – "

But Alex's eyes were soft and Alex's eyes were heady and Alex was closing Kara's bedroom door and she was striding slowly toward Maggie and she was running her fingers through her hair and she was hugging her hips close to hers and bringing her lips to her mouth.

"Did anyone ever tell you it's so fucking sexy when you help people like that? The way you just… my mom isn't an easy egg to crack, you know, and those kids you help at work… you think they call any other cops at all hours of the night for help?"

Alex was kissing, licking, and nipping her way up Maggie's neck, now, and Maggie had to bite her own lip to keep from moaning. Loudly.

"Alex," she managed to choke out raggedly, even as she arched her body into Alex's, even as she grabbed her ass to bring her closer to her. "Babe, your parents – "

"Are both alive and well and _happy_ and admitting that I'm not a failure of a person, thanks to _you_ – " A deeper bite, and Maggie grabbed at her waist, knees almost giving out.

"Kara – " she tried again to falsely protest, but Alex just laughed.

"Should know better than to use her super hearing when other people are behind closed doors, and my _girlfriend_ should know better than to say another woman's name while I'm kissing her like this."

Maggie chuckled and ran her hand over Alex's neck, underneath her hair, and pulled her lips down to meet hers.

"I should, should I?"

"Mmhmmm."

" _Alex_ , god," she breathed as Alex slipped her hand under Maggie's shirt, and it was Alex's turn to chuckle, deep in her throat.

"Getting in the Chanukah spirit now, are we?"

Alex's lips swallowed Maggie's wrecked laughter and Maggie tugged Alex closer to her, needing her, needing her warmth, her spirit, her, her, _her_ , this woman who had been her family's rock for so long, and all Maggie wanted to do was be that for her, closer, closer, _closer,_ and _god_ did she love it when Alex gasped her name like that –

A slight bump and shuffling at the doorway had both Alex and Maggie instinctively reaching for their guns, and Maggie's stomach sank when she saw that the culprit was not an alien invader, not a Cadmus lackey, not a hit man – that would have been easy, that would have been simple, that would have been _not quite so mortifying_ – no. Instead of being walked in on by someone they could _fight_ , Maggie's stomach sank and her heart nearly flipped clean out of her chest: because they were walked in on by Alex's _father_.

"Sir, I – "

" _Dad_ , what – "

"I'm sorry, I'm sorry!" Jeremiah was standing with his hand in front of his eyes, only now peeking to discover that both girls were still – mostly – decent, if heavily disheveled.

"Last time I knocked on your door and you didn't answer, it was because you'd be so caught up in your reading or your music you'd forget to eat; I guess I need to update my Dad protocol, huh?"

Alex's face couldn't possibly be any redder, but she laughed even as she held Maggie's hand in hers in a vice-like grip.

The goofy smile stayed on Jeremiah's face as his eyes shifted from his blushing daughter to her terrified girlfriend.

"Hey, it's okay," he told her, tentatively crossing the room toward her, tentatively extending a hand to her shoulder. "One of the only thoughts that got me through all those years was the hope that Alex was happy. And you…" He glanced down at their connected hands, their interlinked fingers, their slightly heaving chests, their flushed faces. "You make her happy, Maggie. What better Chanukah gift could a father come home to?"

He kissed Maggie softly on the cheek, kissed Alex for a long, long moment on the forehead, and made his way back to the door of Kara's room.

He turned at the threshold and arched an amused eyebrow at his daughter.

"Next time, though, Alex, lock the door: no need to make up for lost time in the traumatizing your father with your sexual exploits department."

Alex groaned and covered her face in her hands and Maggie laughed, laughed, laughed, doubling over into Alex's chest, overcome with relief that she had a future full of holidays that would feel like this.


End file.
